


blood of the covenant

by envysparkler



Series: Reverse Robins [2]
Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: (either of them), Gen, Good Sibling Tim Drake, Jason is tired of everyone thinking that he's going to snap and kill people, Reverse Robins, he's not his brother
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-18
Updated: 2020-11-18
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:35:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27623465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/envysparkler/pseuds/envysparkler
Summary: “Okay, so why are you here?” Tim asked, trying and failing to hide his snappish tone.Jason mumbled something that was very nearly unintelligible.“Garzonas?” Tim repeated, raising an eyebrow, “Felipe Garzonas?”  The diplomat’s son?“B thinks I killed him,” Jason said hollowly.
Relationships: Tim Drake & Jason Todd
Series: Reverse Robins [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2017735
Comments: 90
Kudos: 793





	blood of the covenant

**Author's Note:**

> I'm cackling already.

Tim was rudely awakened by an intruder standing over his head. His fingers closed around the gun under his pillow, safety flicked off as he rolled off the bed, tackling the invader and sending them both crashing to the floor.

Tim pressed the gun to skin, finger curling around the trigger, before he registered black hair and wide, watery blue eyes.

He exhaled shakily. “God-fucking- _dammit_ Jason, stop startling people with justifiable paranoia and hair triggers!” Tim hissed, levering off of the boy and clicking the safety back on the gun, “One of these days I’m going to end up shooting you.”

There was nothing like a shot of adrenaline to wake you up in the morning. Tim sank back down on his bed and let go of the gun to bury his face in his hands. Ra’s had thought it was cute to wake Tim up with death matches for his life, and old habits died hard.

Tim raised his head, intending to thoroughly chew Jason out – or at least until his fingers stopped shaking – only to see that the younger boy hadn’t gotten off the floor. He was leaning against the dresser, knees drawn up to his chest, and –

Tear tracks glinting in the dim light.

Oh, Damian was definitely going to kill him this time.

“Shit,” Tim cursed, clambering off the bed to crouch in front of Jason, “Did I hurt you? Did you hit your head? Are –”

“No,” Jason said hoarsely, curling up further, “You didn’t do anything.”

Tim paused to turn on the bedside lamp and examine Jason in the fresh light. He was dressed in a simple red hoodie and jeans, no mask. His face was puffy and his eyes red – he’d been crying for a while, then.

Tim had not signed up to deal with sobbing children.

“Do you want me to call Bruce?” Tim asked slowly, giving up on the sanctity of his latest safehouse.

“No!” Jason shouted almost immediately, and Tim shifted back to look at him better.

“Damian?” he asked reluctantly.

“No,” Jason mumbled, ducking further into his crossed arms.

Tim was absolutely not qualified for this.

“Are you here for a case?” Tim asked, looking around for any sign of the bag of takeout and coffee that Jason usually brought to bribe him into working together.

Jason shook his head.

Tim ran a hand through his hair, hissed as it got caught in the braid he’d forgotten to untangle before sleeping, and extricated his fingers. “Okay, so why _are_ you here?” Tim asked, trying and failing to hide his snappish tone. Starting the morning with a sudden jolt of terror and no coffee had done absolutely nothing for his already less-than-stellar mood and his annoyance was beginning to take on a green tinge.

Jason mumbled something that was very nearly unintelligible.

“Garzonas?” Tim repeated, raising an eyebrow, “Felipe Garzonas?” The diplomat’s son?

“B thinks I killed him,” Jason said hollowly.

Tim sat back on his heels. As far as he knew, Garzonas had fallen to his death, which was a crying shame. Tim’s plan for him involved waiting until he got all the way back home, smug in his knowledge that he was untouchable, before Tim stepped out with a knife.

Batman’s deal, after all, was no killing in Gotham.

“Damian?” Tim asked quietly.

“He thinks I killed him too,” Jason said, fresh tears slipping out.

Damian tended to be a massive hypocrite on the subject of murder. Tim empathized.

“So did you come here for commiseration or to plot out revenge?” Tim asked, straightening up, “I need to know how awake I need to be for this conversation.”

“You’re not going to ask me if I did it?” Jason tested, looking up at Tim with a glower.

Tim rolled his eyes, “If you’d done it, you certainly wouldn’t be crying about it.”

“He deserved to die!” Jason snapped back, surging to his feet.

“No arguments from me,” Tim hummed, heading towards the kitchen. A fresh pot of coffee was waiting for him and he drained one mug completely and filled up the next before turning to face Jason. “So – commiseration or vengeance?”

Jason had taken a seat at the kitchen table, staring at a piece of paper he was worrying beneath his fingers. “That’s not why I’m here,” he said quietly.

Tim drained the mug and filled it up again. He was definitely not awake enough for this conversation. “Okay,” Tim said, “So what are you here for?”

Jason pressed the paper against the table and began adjusting it. “You know Bruce adopted another kid?”

Tim _really_ wanted to dump this one back on Damian. Why in the world had the kid come to _him_?

“I am aware that there was an incident at a circus and Bruce spotted yet another black-haired, blue-eyed orphan, yes.”

Jason kept tilting the paper, trying to get it to meet some arbitrary angle, and Tim finally snapped, reaching out and snagging the note.

It was a list of names, all female, all beginning with the letter S.

Jason nearly lunged across the table to get it back and Tim straightened out of the chair, leaning against the counter and holding it high above Jason’s head when the younger boy jumped.

“Give it back!” Jason hissed, abruptly furious, “That’s _mine_!” He attempted to elbow Tim in the stomach, and Tim blocked, twisting Jason’s arm behind his back and forcing him still.

“You’re going to spit out what you came here for in the next five seconds, baby bird, or I’m going to dislocate your shoulder,” Tim snarled, the room shaded in hues of green.

Jason continued struggling for three of those seconds, before he exhaled and went limp. “I want to find my mom,” he said, his voice breaking.

Tim let him go. Jason straightened, rubbing his shoulder and glaring at Tim. Tim ignored him in favor of scanning the note again.

“I thought your mom was dead,” Tim said finally.

Jason shrugged, observing the floor with the kind of concentration he usually reserved for active crime scenes. “Yeah,” he said, and his voice was cracking again, “I thought so too. Apparently she wasn’t my real mom. There was a box of my – of her – of stuff at a neighbor’s house, and the name on my birth certificate sure didn’t spell out Catherine Todd.” Jason nodded at the list of names in Tim’s hand, “Possible options.”

Tim let out a slow, heavy exhale.

“I just –” Jason started, and then broke off. “I just want to find a parent who loves me,” he said, voice small, and fuck, Tim was going to pretend he didn’t hear that.

Long-buried, never-healed wounds always lurked right beneath the surface and Jason’s painful honesty was starting to tear them open.

“Okay, baby bird,” Tim rasped, “You want to find your bio mom, we’ll find your bio mom.”

* * *

Tim did some careful digging – which would’ve been finished a lot faster and with a whole lot less twitchiness if Jason hadn’t insisted on hovering over Tim’s shoulder and setting off all his instincts to trained people standing in his periphery.

Fortunately, Tim was able to cross several names off the list by cross-referencing locations and times, along with the facial features that Jason had not inherited from Willis Todd. Unfortunately, one of the two names left was one that Tim recognized.

“Sandra Wu-san,” Jason read out from behind him, “And Sheila Haywood. How do we know which one it is?”

“Both are possible candidates,” Tim said, “I’m doing more digging into Haywood, but –” Tim made a face at the last name, “We won’t get anything out of _her_ unless we ask her face-to-face, and probably not even then.”

“What?” Jason asked, “Why?”

“Because Sandra Wu-san is more commonly known by the name Lady Shiva,” Tim said dryly.

He saw Jason’s face bloom with hope and instantly knew that it was the wrong thing to say.

“That’s Cass’s mother, right?” Jason said, eyes alight as he leaned in closer, “It _has_ to be her!”

“Jason –”

“Where is she right now –” Jason brushed past Tim and started typing on the computer, straightening with a triumphant sound when the computer located a match, “Lebanon!”

“Jason!”

Jason stilled, hunching back with narrowed eyes as Tim glared at him. “I’m going,” the kid said defiantly, “I’ll find her. And I’m not going to let anyone stop me.”

Tim momentarily considered letting him go and washing his hands of the whole affair. And then he considered tying the kid up and dropping him back off at the Manor.

Jason’s eyes glittered, hard with determination and cut by desperate hope.

Finally, Tim sighed, “I’ll book two tickets to Lebanon.”

* * *

“You are going to shut up and not move an inch from my side unless I tell you to,” Tim muttered under his breath as they entered a lounge, already knowing it was a lost cause. All he could really hope for was that Lady Shiva considered them amusing.

Jason was almost bouncing on the balls of his feet. Tim was loath to crack that optimism, but he knew he had to puncture it sooner or later. The fact that Jason was no doubt suppressing was that whoever his biological mother was, she’d handed him over to Willis and hadn’t bothered contacting him in fifteen years.

“A pair of little birds,” came the smooth voice behind them and Tim turned easily, forcing Jason a half-step behind him.

“Lady Shiva,” Tim said flatly, resisting the urge to deny that he was a bird in any way, shape, or form.

“I see rumors of your death were greatly exaggerated, little dragon,” Lady Shiva smiled, looking him over, before her eyes focused on his face and her smile froze, “And that the Demon always gets what he wants in the end.”

“Not this time,” Tim forced his voice level. Lady Shiva raised an eyebrow and tilted the same politely curious gaze on Jason. There was no flash of recognition in her eyes, not that that meant much when it came to her.

“I heard you were looking for me, little dragon,” Lady Shiva said, turning her gaze back to Tim, “How is Cassandra?”

“Fine,” Tim said, “Hiking in Tibet I believe.” Lady Shiva’s face softened just a fraction, and Tim went for the strike. “I’m here to ask you if you have another.”

“Another…?”

“Another child.”

Lady Shiva stared blankly at Tim for a long moment before her gaze drifted to Jason. Tim didn’t know what expression the younger boy was wearing, but Lady Shiva’s expression shifted to something that might’ve been called sympathetic. “No,” she said slowly, “I don’t have another child.”

Tim gave her a quick nod of acknowledgement. “Thanks,” he said, pushing Jason towards the exit, “That’s all we were here for.”

“I want a rematch at some point, little dragon,” Lady Shiva called out, “I want to see how death changed you.”

_No_ , Tim thought, _you really fucking don’t_.

“Where’s your staff?” she asked curiously and Tim couldn’t hide his shudder.

“I don’t use it anymore,” he said, clipped, steering Jason away.

“That’s a shame,” she said softly, “You were the best student I’ve ever had.”

“Goodbye, Lady Shiva,” Tim said, dragging Jason out the door.

The kid had gone still and silent, staring blankly into the distance. “Jason?” Tim asked quietly, placing a careful hand on his shoulder.

“Was she telling the truth?” Jason asked, his voice small.

If Lady Shiva was lying, they’d never be able to tell. “I think she would’ve wanted to speak to you if you were her child,” Tim said slowly. She cared for Cassandra in her own way, and Tim was fairly certain that if Jason was her son, she’d find some way to meet him.

Jason exhaled shakily. “There’s another name on the list,” he said quietly.

Tim took a deep breath, “Yes, there is.”

* * *

It didn’t take long for Tim to hunt down information on the last name on Jason’s list, and Jason stopped pacing around their hotel room to peer over Tim’s shoulder.

“She’s a doctor in a refugee camp in Ethiopia!” Jason said, delighted.

Tim winced, “Jason –”

“That’s close by. We could be there by evening!”

“Jason –”

“Come on, book the plane tickets and I’ll make sure we didn’t lose anything.”

“ _Jason_.”

Jason’s smile faltered, but he kept it pinned in place as he turned towards Tim. “What?” he asked flippantly, but Tim could see the dread in his wide blue eyes.

“She’s embezzling funds from the camp,” Tim said slowly, unsure of how to break the news gently, “I’ve already sent the tip to the authorities. She’ll be arrested soon.”

Jason’s smile fractured into a dozen pieces. Tim watched as something cracked behind Jason’s eyes, threads of hope snapping, one by one. “Four parents,” Jason said hoarsely, “Two of them are criminals, one was a drug addict, and the last dresses up as a bat to fight crime. How is this my fucking life?”

Tim stayed silent, watching Jason carefully as the younger boy wrapped his arms around himself, looking like a lost fifteen-year-old instead of the cocky, confident Robin he usually was.

“Let’s go,” Jason said finally, his eyes burning with cold fire.

“To Gotham?” Tim asked without any real hope.

“To the refugee camp,” Jason said coldly, “I need to know if it’s her. I need to look her in the eyes and ask her why she left me.”

Tim sighed, but booked the tickets – they would land in four hours, which should give them enough time to find Sheila Haywood and talk before someone showed up to arrest her.

Something was giving Tim a bad feeling about this. Haywood had assembled quite a lot of money from her criminal side gig and it was sitting in her bank account, more or less untouched. It didn’t make any sense, unless she was playing a long game.

And Tim didn’t like to confront people when he didn’t know what their motives were.

* * *

Tim knew that this was the right one before she even opened her mouth – Jason had her mouth and her eyes, though currently both were narrowed into a snarl. “Hello,” Dr. Haywood greeted them both, clearly wary of both their general appearance and Jason’s surly mood. “Can I help you?”

Jason stepped forward with the swagger Tim usually saw when he was confronting criminals. “Yeah,” he sneered, “We wanted to know if you abandoned any babies in Gotham fifteen years ago.”

Oh, this was definitely not going to end well.

Tim sighed and turned away, examining the rest of the camp and leaving Jason and Haywood some measure of privacy to continue their conversation. Though that privacy was quickly becoming moot as their voices raised loud enough that several people began turning in their direction.

“– you don’t understand what it’s like –”

“I was _your son_!”

“– Jason, please, you don’t –”

“Don’t what?” Jason laughed, chill and unamused, “Don’t know why you’d move to a different country and start embezzling money from a refugee camp? Yeah, that’s right, we know about that, and so do the authorities.”

Tim winced and turned back to catch Jason’s angry, defiant glare. Haywood, however, didn’t look cowed or disbelieving or scared. She simply looked…resigned.

Something curdled in Tim’s stomach.

“That doesn’t matter,” she said quietly, “They’re not going to do anything about it.”

“Oh?” Tim said, reinserting himself into the conversation, “And why is that?” He gave her one of his high-society smiles, the ones even Damian shivered at, and let her draw her own conclusions.

Tim didn’t know if he’d feel bad for killing Jason’s biological mother in front of him, but he knew that it wouldn’t stop him.

“The authorities are…encouraged to look the other way when it comes to this camp,” Haywood sighed.

“Encouraged by _who_?” Tim snarled.

Haywood darted a look around them before dropping her voice. “The League of Assassins,” she whispered.

Of _fucking_ course.

Jason, the idiot, had stepped forward with bright eyes. “We can help you,” he said, catching hold of his bio mom’s hands. She looked extremely skeptical. “We can,” Jason insisted, and opened his backpack to reveal folds of bright red. “I’m Robin,” he whispered, “And I can help you get away from the League.”

Tim wanted to laugh. It had taken him _three years_ to get away from the League, and even now he tried not to venture out of Gotham if he didn’t have to. Gotham was safe. Nowhere else was, and _especially_ not a refugee camp that doubled as a League front.

Tim grabbed Jason’s shoulder and pulled him back before he could promise anything else. “Nope,” he said coldly, “We’re leaving.”

Jason turned to him with an angry glare and Haywood darted forward, eyes wide, “Can you really help me?”

“No,” Tim repeated, “ _We’re leaving_.”

“We’re not leaving my _mom_ here,” Jason hissed, trying to jerk out of Tim’s grasp, but Tim held fast.

“Please,” Haywood said, her eyes turning watery, “Please, if you can get me out of here, _please_ –”

“We’ll get you out,” Jason started again and Tim tightened his grip until it was painful.

“No,” Tim said with finality. Jason stared at him with wide, betrayed eyes, mirrored on his biological mother’s face. Only one set were real.

“You’re not begging us to save you,” Tim turned his cold stare on Haywood, “You’re begging because there’s a standing League bounty on Robin’s head.”

Jason stopped struggling to get out of Tim’s grasp.

“But you’re operating under a false assumption,” Tim said flatly, “The Robin in question isn’t Jason, it’s me. So, selling out your own child will get you _nothing_.”

Jason swiveled to turn that betrayed gaze on Haywood. The woman spluttered for a moment before her face went cold and her eyes turned to ice.

Tim was wrong. Jason hadn’t inherited his mother’s eyes.

“You were planning to just _hand me over_?” Jason whispered, quiet and broken.

“You have no idea how much money it is,” Haywood snapped, stepping back. She was eyeing Tim with speculation, and Tim knew they were quickly overstaying their welcome.

“Believe me, I know exactly how badly Ra’s wants me back,” Tim said, keeping his voice level, “And it’s clearly not as much as you value your son.”

This time, Jason didn’t protest as Tim tugged him away from his biological mother. “We’re just going to let her get away with it?” Jason asked quietly, staring at her with seething hatred and broken disappointment.

“I think living under the League’s thumb is punishment enough,” Tim said, watching Haywood’s eyes flash, “And besides, we have company.”

Jason darted his head up, instantly alert, scanning the crowd for anyone out of place. They weren’t difficult to find – there was only one person shoving through the crowd, green-blue eyes narrowed and wearing a look that promised murder.

Jason squeaked and tried to edge behind Tim. Tim reached out to drag him back to the front. He wasn’t facing Damian without a human shield.

“Jason,” Damian seethed when he got close enough. Tim edged further behind Jason – he usually had a helmet to blunt the full force of the older man’s rage. “ _Timothy_.”

“I took out all the trackers in the suit,” Jason said, twisting to look up at Tim with wide eyes, “I swear I did!”

“Did you think that you could hide from _me_?” Damian snarled. Jason looked like he was regretting every decision he’d made today. “Come on,” Damian snapped, turning on his heel, “We’re heading back.”

Jason turned a pleading look on Tim, but Tim just nudged him after Damian. There were very few reasons for which Tim would willingly put himself in the path of an enraged Nightwing, and saving Jason from a lecture was not one of them.

Besides, Tim was pretty sure that Damian wanted to disembowel him, and he liked his guts where they were.

Jason meekly followed Damian onto the Batplane, parked in a plain a few minutes away from the camp, but Tim hesitated on the threshold. Damian increased the force of his glower from where he stood by the door and Tim eased inside, trying not to turn his back on Damian.

It had been a while since Tim had last been inside the Batplane. Tim was sure that the click of the door closing hadn’t sounded so much like dread the last time.

* * *

Damian waited until they were thirty minutes out before his anger exploded. Tim was honestly a little impressed he managed to hold it in that long.

“What were you _thinking_?” Damian shouted, “Leaving Gotham without a _trace_ –”

“Like you even cared,” Jason shouted back, “With _Dick_ hanging around you all the time –”

“Did you even stop to consider what we would think when we realized you were missing –”

“You thought I was a murderer –”

“I was trying to get it through your head that Father wasn’t going to send you away! He still hasn’t managed to disown _Timothy_ –”

Tim hunched further in the corner and pretended he was a part of the plane.

“Because _that’s_ what my problem was! God, Damian, you don’t even know –”

“Well, clearly that’s what had you running to the Red Hood for reassurance –”

“I didn’t want reassurance!” Jason screamed, his face red, “I just wanted someone to believe me!”

Damian stared at him, apparently startled into silence. Jason took heaving breaths, his eyes glittering again. “I’m not a _murderer_ ,” Jason said viciously, and shoved past Damian to enter the cockpit, slamming the door shut behind him.

Damian turned his stare on Tim. Tim ignored him and took out a knife to fiddle with.

“You took Jason out of Gotham,” Damian said coldly, “You nearly got both of you captured by the League.”

Tim kept silent. The knife needed to be sharpened, but he didn’t remember where he’d kept his whetstone.

“If I hadn’t arrived –”

Tim raised his head. “Of the two of us, which one has a better track record of keeping Robins alive?” he asked mildly.

Damian’s face looked like it had turned to stone.

“That’s what I thought,” Tim said, straightening out of his chair. He forced himself to not tense as he passed a silent Damian, but Damian didn’t try to get in his way.

Tim paused with one hand on the cockpit door. “He’s not me,” Tim said quietly, “Stop treating him like he is.”

_Or that’s exactly what he’ll become_.

**Author's Note:**

> Admit it, I had you going.


End file.
